1989 California Sparkler and Locavore food.

Last night it was a hoot of a time.  David had found a 1987 bottle of California sparkling white bottled for the 50th anniversary of the Golden Gate Bridge.   We brought it up to Ashland for the wine and cheese party Jane and Peter planned to inaugurate a new gorgeous of rooms at the Winchester.   John thinks the small photo essay shows the reactions: 

Label Intact

Perhaps the photo essay shows the reactions to the brown, but still fizzy, liquid. 

Ben, The Arbiter of Taste, pronounces
the wine undrinkable

David awaits the opening with great anticipation.  The cork broke.

Peter had already tried it.  Jane sips
before making her decision

Dick did not try

CB did try

Jane overcame the experience

Andy knew better

Then it was off to Lorella's, the old Scarpetti's from last year, for a locavore and mostly vegetarian feast.   The only meats were a rib eye and a loin of pork.   The broccoli grilled with cheese, the salads of pea shoots, the porcini, and all the rest was superb.  Huge portions.  Beautifully presented.  The room is a bit loud, but we managed to hear everything.    The wines were excellent, a Cowhorn Applegate Valley Spiral 36 white blend and a Plaisance Ranch cabernet franc, both 2014, all met John's approval.

At this point, John is feeling no sciatic pain!

Valley "Chinese", Valley Urgicare, Alchemy and Medea

As you can tell by the heading, this is an eclectic mix of subjects! 

David and Andy's Front Porch

David and Andy's Healdsburg

First, we finished a fine visit with David in Healdsburg  on Wednesday.  He and Ben purchased a large halibut steak and brussels sprouts for our final dinner there.  Of course, John had to know recipes for this: He did.   Halibut grilled ten minutes to the inch, and brussels sprouts with ginger, garlic and Worcestershire sauce.   Lobster ravioli as the starter.  (The lobsters, David said, were freshly caught while they were vacationing in the Russian River.  Crafty Californians always know how to get the best seafood!)

Calistoga Cappuccino

Thursday, we drove from Healdsburg on back roads (very nice back roads at 55 mph) to I-5 and then up to Ashland.  David had never done most of the back roads.  Ben and John had never done any of them.  It was a gorgeous day pushing our Hyundai Elantra first through miles and miles of vineyards and fancy wineries, then over the mountains covered with golden grasses and live oaks.  We stopped for a fine cappuccino in Calistoga at  a a café mobbed with bicyclists riding the roads in the 95F-34C bright sunny weather.  We passed through the area around Middletown where the oaks and grasses had been burnt to a crisp.  We remarked about the difficulties fire-fighters had getting to the blazes.

Then to I-5:  The West coast's main north south truck route, flat as a pancake scenery, mountains in the distance.  David who is from North Dakota and grew up on a farm was fascinated.  "Oh, I moved hay like that, we had silos like those where the cows used to drink the fermented juices and get drunk, falling down in the grass,'" adding that he had had several major and expensive tractor mishandlings while doing this farm hand work on his folks' farm. He said he was banned from the tractors henceforth.

John had a hankering for Chinese food, particularly noodles.  Is this possible in the very sparse and rural parts of Northern California.   We found out!  Off I-5 at  Willows, a pre-eminent example of a rural farm community in California--a welders shop, hardware stores, farm machinery stores, a rail line, corn silos and a smattering of bars and food stops.  One could never call them restaurants.

Fu Hing Restaurant Willows CA

And lo and behold on the main street was a Chinese restaurant.  The Fu Hing Chinese and Japanese.  We stopped, and entered.  Many combination plates, many dishes and even some pot stickers on the menu.  Ben had chicken with broccoli and rice, David had Mongolian beef with broccoli and rice.  We ordered six pot stockers (not bad--even came with hot sauce), and John splurged on a combination plate of chow mien, egg foo yung and sweet and sour chicken.  It can be said that Ben and David's meals were somewhat chinese-y, and John's noodles were very nice--and fit the bill--(which was enormously low).  However his egg foo yung, supposedly an Americanized version of an Chinese egg dish came out as a corn pancake, and his sweet and sour chicken, which is of little interest to begin with, came out as chicken Mc-Nuggets.   We couldn't complain because the bill was very tiny and the service very very good.   The owner's wife even queried John where we live and when told we were visiting from DC and had wanted Chinese food encouraged us to come back.   This was a pleasant, quite nice, actually, slice of life.

We arrived in Ashland late afternoon and enjoyed a wonderful dinner with our hosts here, Jane and Peter, David's husband Andy who flew in from St Paul, Minnesota, and Dick and CB whom we met in Burgundy several years ago.  Lovely meal where Ben had scallops and a soup--strawberry and black bean gazpacho.  John had a Dungeness and seaweed salad as a starter and then foie gras as his main.   Alchemy is listed highly by Wine Spectator and several other foodie publications.   The wine certainly added: Upper Five Rogue Valley sauvignon blanc for the second courses and a pinot gris for the first.  Since we had not eaten large firsts or seconds, we splurged and had a group of desserts.  Lovely evening.

John had trouble sleeping since his massage and acupuncture appeared to have worn off somewhat. This morning he and Ben talked about medical care.  We ended up at the Valley Immediate Care Center a bit out of town.  There Matthew Smith, a Physician's Assistant, had John discussing his sciatica and then within 15 minutes had him injected with cortisone and given him a prescription for oxycodone and if needed some tramadol to get him back to DC.  Very professional, very complete, and very good.  Five star treatment.  Not busy on a Thursday morning.  

This afternoon we thoroughly enjoyed "Mojada:  A Medea in Los Angeles."  It was written by Luis Alfaro as a contemporary variant of the Greek classic Medea dealing with Mexican immigrants to LA.  It is powerful, spiritual, lyrical and superbly acted. It clearly resonates with today's  immigration debates (if you can call them that). 

Massage, Acupuncture and Car Rentals

Unable to walk much, due to a massive attack of sciatica in his RIGHT hip, John decided to try everything he could to get rid of it.  Started out yesterday with a full Swedish massage, deeply moving around the leg muscles.  Very good masseuse--educated in Rhode Island, no less--and John managed to sleep most of the night.  

This morning it was off to the acupuncturist, a new and novel experience for him.  it's painless, and probably is causing some improvement, though it's still only eight hours since the needling was finished.  He is managing and iBen is always behind him if he appears about to take a fall.  (We have no pictures of his legs giving way under him on David's porch.)

David is proving a saint.  He agreed to help with the driving from here to Ashland, which meant getting him on the rental agreement.  Thrifty was generally unhelpful.  They couldn't easily connect John to the Oakland Airport office where he took on the car.  Three times till one of the phone operators connected him to Roadside Assistance.  They told him he  could get the contract amended at any Thrifty agency, but there are none within sixty miles of here!  In the end John went to some page he found on the web and found that there was an "agency" in Sonoma.   He called it and the answer was "HERTZ RENTACAR".   We had forgotten that Hertz owns Thrifty.  The agent said he could do what we needed but it would be better to go to the office in Santa Rosa 20 minutes away.  We drove there to the address on the web.  it turned out to be Enterprise.  The lovely agent was quite willing to add David to the contracrt until she reallzed it was Thrifty's.  Sorry.  Off we went to the new Hertz office where they did the deed.  So much better, but clearly one must know how to make this system work!  

Tomorrow we head off to the north, David and John splitting the driving, which John finds he can do.  Walking is a bitch for him, and his legs sometimes decide not to hold him up.  But they can push an accelerator and most of the way will be cruise controlled.  We'll split the driving and John hopes he'll master the stairs at the Inn in Ashland.  

David's place in Healdsburg is gorgeous.  And the food and wine have been lovely.   We will miss our time here.  Our only regret is not seeing his husband Andy, who lives most of the time in St  Paul.  He will join us in Oregon.

Santa Rosa and then to Healdsburg with fruit

Who could pass up Lliberace in Lego?

Our friend Ruth waved goodbye as we left San Francisco after a lovely three days in the city.  A very good time, full of fun and good friends.  We will remember it.

Now we are in Healdsburg visiting friend David at his place up the hill from the Russian River.  A wonderful home built into the side of the mountain, very good wines (last night's Guenoc Sauvignon Blanc and lunch time's Raffinelli bought at the winery) that make conversation easy and eating pleasant.

We stopped on the way in Santa Rosa at the old railroad station for Ben's coffee.  Aroma Café, such a novel name, provided a very good cuppa for him as John checked out the day's farmers market, the old RR station and the plans for high speed travel along this corridor for trains from Santa Rosa Airport to Marin County. 

Santa Rosa is the home of the late Charles Schulz who drew the Peanuts cartoon strips.  Of course Snoopy has a role at the Railroad Square.

 

 

Healdsburg is a lovely little upscale town, upscale shops and upscale coffee emporia that fit Ben's needs.   We enjoyed buying croissants to go with the beautfiul fresh strawberries from the farmers market in Santa Rosa.

Lunch--coid cuts and the lovely 2012 cabernet sauvignon from the Rafanelli winery where David buys a case a year--the limit.   Most of it goes to restaurants, but a few cases get sold at retail.  It was very good.   The sauvignon blanc, from Guenoc (pron Gwen-ock) in Lake County was sweeter than a New Zealand or French sauv and went very well with the roast chicken in lemon sauce we had for dinner last night.

Unfortunately John has developed some leg issues so this afternoon he is having a Swedish massage at the Spa in downtown Healdsburg and going for acupuncture first think in the morning.  Acupuncture will be new and novel.  And how California!  We'll see if ti provides short-term rellef.

The Golden Gate, Muir Beach and Good Food

San Francisco not only flies gay flags for Pride Day, it decorates the twin peaks of the chest of the reclining Indian maiden who is supposed to be asleep on Twin Peaks.  A big pink triangle fills the cleavage.   And the rest of the city goes wild.  Today was merely the Dykes on Bikes event but it closed down access along Market St for most of the day.  We had a drive around all that, first, out to Land's End past the Golden Gate Bridge, and then off north across it.

Let's face it, getting out to Marin County for our adventure in the redwoods was difficult.  But, once there the roads through the coastal range are gorgeous. Amidst a gulley near Muir Beach is a farm run by the San Francisco Zen Center, called Green Gulch.  The place is a center of reflection with a peace garden and a fabulous gong and tea house.  Very restful. We're told that the fruits and vegetable grown there are used in a restaurant in San Francisco called Green.

A bit further toward the coast is the Pelican Inn, a 17th century British pub moved and rebuilt on the edge of Muir Woods. Good cider by the half mug, a ploughman's lunch of cheese, bread, chutney and greens for John and real fish and chips for Ben.  Bangers and mash for Ruth.  Thence to a the beach for a quick look around.  Because it was still cold and cloudy, we decided to continue on the road over the mountains through gorgeous redwood forests stoping in Larkspur for Ben's cappuccino at Emporio Rulli.  It was one of the best he's had so far this trip.  

Not John's meat loaf, and not bad!

Dinner last night at the Blue Plate in the Mission.  Just down the street at the local lesbian bar the lines were almost around the block in celebration of Pride.  The Blue Plate flew its rainbow while we enjoyed meat loaf, ravioli, ling cod, and two half bottles--one of pouilly fuissé and another Chehalem pinot noir from the Willamette Valley.


What made the evening was spending time with John's godson, John, the son of his college room-mate.  Great fun to see him.

Bart, Berkeley and Revelry

June 24, 2017.  

It took us a few minutes to actually get Muni's app to work on the cellphone, but once we did it getting around SF at reduced senior citizen's rates is so easy.  Muni, the San Francisco bus, tram, cable car and trolley bus network gets you around at the reduced senior rate of only $1 for each 90 minutes of travel.  More expensive than Washington, but not much.  And you just tap on your phone to say you are using a ticket and on you go.

We had thought to use BART's senior rate too, but that required a base purchase of $9-worth of tickets and we were only using $8-worth to our destination, Berkeley, so not this time.  No reason to.  

----

The flags were flying up and down Market Street when we got downtown yesterday.  Of course, it was all for us:  Every rainbow flag said "Thanks, Ben and John for gracing our city."   Laugh.   We walked toward the Embarcadero station for our trip to Berkeley, passing the end of Battery Street where John worked from 1970 to 1972 and even glancing at the building he worked in.  

BART trains are old.  We think of our original Metro cars in Washington DC as ready for the heap, but BART cars are even older than our 1976 vintage.  The majority date from 1972 when the system opened and they look it.  However, they work.  Like the 120-year old cable cars and the 60-year old rehabilitated street cars on Market Street.

U.Cal. Berkeley is beautiful.  
Set on the side of the East Hills overlooking San Francisco bay, the turn-of-the-last-century architecture, mostly Beaux Arts, contrasts with the Italianate hillsides. Of course, much of the modern, brutalist architecture, of which there is a good deal, only semi-fits but some of it is quite grand and a good bit of it seems to fit Ben's taste, though not John's.   

We were, of course, only semi-prepared for our visit, so a very nice bear in the Mathematics Library helped us with a map of the campus and some directions.  We did not manage to hear a campanile concert, but we did enter some of the grand buildings and were awed by their interiors.  It's a very pretty place.  And apparently ready to Resist! too.




Lunch at the PiQ Café: The lovely broken-heart design cappuccino froth the barista made for Ben was a work of art.   John's prosciutto baguette was also very good for a light lunch.   We headed back to San Francisco to take a look at the addition to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.  Short of time, we did not venture in, but it is very fitting and an architecturally sound addition.  

It's totally unlike much of the modern architecture sprouting here.  A good bit of it is tasteless.  The new skyscrapers are ghastly.  The old Bank of America building and the Transamerica Pyramid that were widely disliked in the 60s and 70s are now miniatures compared to the size of some of the new carbuncles, to quote Prince Charles.  Just wait until the subsoil liquifies in an earthquake.  

The new housing, too, going up on every piece of vacant land gives only lip-service to the bay-windowed Victoriana that has been an identifiable mark of the city's residential sections since the 1906 earthquake.  They do have bay windows, but there is nothing that is quaint or lovable about them.  And at $5000 a month for 800 square feet, it's a shame.  Fortunately we are not staying in one of those buildings. 

After a short nap, we headed out to dinner with our old Washington friends Dixon and Jeremy at one of their local bistros in the Hayes Valley.  Revelry is French-fusion I suppose. The maitre-d' is from Strasbourg, and knows his stuff.  The chef turned out a series of lovely dishes, starting with a crudo of kingfish, moving on to a lovely home-made pâté de fois, and a roasted artichoke stuffed with cream cheese and parmesan.  This was washed down with a dry Seillac sparkling Burgundy rosé.   We moved on from that to the mains:  Ben had a lovely wild mushroom risotto, while John enjoyed gnocchi in a sauce of arugula, wild mushrooms, fresh Spring peas, and cream.  Jeremy dug into a duck confit and goat salad and Dixon enjoyed a nicely done filet mignon.   We had a small, shared, clafouti for dessert.  Dixon had brought a Dehlinger Syrah from Sebastopol, California, to go with the main meal, which fit it very well.  It was great to spend an evening with them.

Breakfast on Potrero Hill

Sitting looking at the fog bank creeping over Twin Peaks from the west side of Potrero Hill, nibbling on a "all things" fresh croissant--that's whitefish and cream cheese wrapped in croissant pastry--is just a great way to spend an early morning.  Amazing how you can enjoy 7:00AM trips to the croissanterie.  Friend Ruth lives on the side of the Hill as she and neighbor refer to it, and knows all the local places for all the best of everything.   
The trip out yesterday was basically uneventful, though John left his cell-phone at home, realizing it only when we were halfway to Baltimore Washington Airport.  That required a quick sending of emails to all who might be trying to contact us that only Ben's phone would get through to us.

Southwest did us fine, though their new planes do not have reclining seats---that's fine if you don't like the passenger in front of you leaning back, but rough if you want to nap.  The trip, after a delay at Midway Chicago, meant an hour-late arrival in Oakland, and then after getting the car, about an hour to get across the San Francisco Bay Bridge.  Nothing you can do about it, but it's not a fun way to spend a rush-hour.  

But dinner made up for it.  Friend Ruth had just returned the day before from England, but put out a feast of poached salmon, foul (pron. fool--a Syrian fava bean salad), and lovely fresh bread, coupled with a chardonnay.  A local friend, Katrina, who's a pianist and world traveller, joined us for a night of full conversation before our hitting bed and falling asleep.

Today it is off to Berkeley, a place John hasn't visited since 1970 and Ben has never seen.  

A Fine Wedding

John had meant to post a short piece about our weekend in Pittsburgh earlier this month,  but the time seemed to slip through his fingers.  Anyway, the marriage of a dear relative took place on a beautiful afternoon in Frick Park on the grounds of the old Henry Clay Frick Mansion.  Perfect day.  The flowers, all peonies, glistened.  The food, champagne and drinks were excellent.  

We also enjoyed a meal at our favorite Pittsburgh Turkish restaurant, Istanbul Sofra in Regent Square with close friends.  All in all a fine trip.

Pittsburgh and a wedding.

John hadn't realized that we had written nothing on this blog for several months.  In truth, we haven't traveled that much since last Summer but now we are undertaking a Summer and Fall of movement.  Our first trip, for a long weekend, is to Pittsburgh for the wedding of a cousin.  We expect this event at the Frick Museum to be a wonderful one.

Last night, June 1, we had dinner with dear old friends here in the 'Burgh at Avenue B.  It's in Shadyside on Centre Avenue in an older building abutting the street.   Fortunately, even though it is a large space, it doesn't have bad acoustics and we actually could hear ourselves talk.  

Avenue B is a BYOB restaurant, which is rather good for wine-drinkers like the four of us.  We arrived with a bottle of Aglianico del Vulture from the slopes of Mt Vesuvious, and our hosts provide another red, a 2011 Rioja Riserva from Spain.   Both excellent vintages, though the Aglicanico was more tannic.

The food at Avenue B is excellent.   Chef Chris Bofili has an eclectic style--with eclectic here taking its classical definition of the "best" of everything.   He has a good way with shellfish and his appetizers are quite experimental.   The restaurant has been around for several years but still makes it on to Pittsburgh Magazine's top restaurant list.

The four of us enjoyed two large appetizers:  A rainbow sashimi, which included tuna and a variety of chopped vegetables served on a platter for all to dig in, and a gorgonzola honey spread with balsamic onions and vegetables served with whole grain bread.   An excellent accompaniment to the Rioja.

Our mains were a shrimp and scallop risotto, which looked magnificent in its large bowl and satisifed our hostess, and for three of us, soft shell crab with a cold pea salad and a scallop.  The Aglianco fit these nicely too.

We did not do dessert.   The French press coffee was bland, the only negative in an excellent meal.  The server was superb and left us to our long conversation when we were deeply involved in it.